“I can only say you are not alone” Suicide rates rise for U.S. veterinarians

By Lyn Keren, Staff Writerlkeren@amestrib.com

Saturday

Mar 30, 2019 at 12:01 AM

“The hardest thing for me to hear is ‘he was the last person we expected to do that,’” said Hubbell Animal Hospital Veterinarian Dr. Kelsey Witte about her mentor who committed suicide less than a year ago.

Witte’s mentor’s death is part of the growing conversation and concern in the veterinarian community regarding mental illness and the increase of suicide rates within the profession.

A study published by the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) in January was conducted to asses suicides among U.S. veterinarians through the years of 1979 to 2015.

The study found that male veterinarians were 2.1 times more likely to die of suicide than the U.S. general population. Female veterinarians were 3.1 times more likely to die from suicide.

The study sampled 11,620 deaths of veterinarians and 398 of them were ruled as death by suicide. Of those deaths, 148 veterinarians were between the ages of 45 to 64. 119 of them were between the ages of 25 to 44.

U.S. Veterinarian Suicide DemographicsInfogram

Witte’s mentor was was 44-years-old when he died by suicide last summer. Witte, who’s practice is currently based in Altoona, worked with her mentor during her undergraduate education, and it was a very good experience as her first in the veterinary field, she said.

“He was always the positive person that made light of every situation, that made it more manageable,” she said. “You can just watch a veterinarian like him and see how much passion they have and care they have, and empathy for the patients, the clients and the employees they have.”

She said even with his positive and empathetic nature, he dealt with struggles in his life that made the profession difficult.

Research from the study states that occupational stress such as bad outcomes, compassion fatigue, rising veterinary care costs, and student debt are likely contributors to a greater number of deaths by suicide among veterinarians.

Altoona Veterinary Hospital Veterinarian Dr. Bill Williams said bad outcomes can be stressful for veterinarians because of the way they went through their education.

“You are trained to study, you learn and pass the test. There is a pass or fail, and fail is not an option,” he said.

With that educational training comes a need for high achievement at all times, but that does not always translate over to the profession’s duties and outcomes.

“You can do everything right when you are practicing medicine. There aren’t always exact answers or outcomes,” Williams said. “You can do everything the way any instructor or textbook or website would tell you, you are supposed to do it and it doesn’t go out the way it was supposed to.”

Williams said the constant pressure to keep patients healthy, clients happy, and the status of high achievement can be wearing on any person in a veterinary clinic.

“When dealing with that, from day-to-day, and the pressure that comes with on the other end of that animal is a person who wants the animal to get better,” he said.

Compassion fatigue is a term for the emotional aspect of witnessing trauma, according to Iowa State University Veterinary Medicine Counselor Lauren Youngs.

Youngs joined the College of Veterinary Medicine nine-months-ago as part of the first embedded counseling initiative in a specific college at the university.

She said as a counseling student, she learned about vicarious trauma — witnessing the trauma of a client. Vicarious trauma can have effects such burnout and fatigue that can be extremely wearing, she said.

“(Compassion fatigue) is specifically on the emotional aspect (of vicarious trauma),” Youngs said. “There are unique moral and ethical challenges that (veterinarians) face that can bring on that compassion fatigue.”

Financial burden is an increasing issue for post-graduate veterinarians due to the debt-to-income ratio they face.

AVMA statistical analyst Charlotte Hansen, for the AVMA Veterinary Economics Decision, said at a conference that 2018 graduates with debt had borrowed $50,000 to $100,000 to cover the cost of attendance plus interest. The average starting salary for 2018 graduates was $76,633.

Witte said the system of veterinary medicine is conducted in a way that can make veterinary care costs rise, which can frustrate pet owners that might not be able to afford treatment for their animal.

“We have specialized equipment that is expensive, and we have degrees that have put us in a financial situation where we don’t make a lot of money,” Witte said.

Those rising care costs can also cause pet owners to question the empathetic nature most veterinarians possess, making their jobs even more difficult, she said.

“Owners will say ‘you don’t care, you just want money’ when we are in the back of our heads saying, if we wanted money we wouldn’t be here,” Witte said.

A veterinarian combats all the stressors on a daily basis, which can possibly lead to the decision to take one’s life, Williams said.

“That can be stressful at times,” Williams said. “That starts on that path down social isolation, depression, and eventually worse if (the person doesn’t) find a way out.”

Witte said people suspected her mentor was struggling, but were scared to approach the topic head on.

“I regret (not asking him) to this day because I had heard he was struggling with some mental health and I had never asked,” she said. “I think it would have made a difference, I don’t know.”

Witte said her mentor’s enthusiastic personality made it even harder to face the fact that he committed suicide.

“The hardest thing for me to hear is he was the last person we expected to do that,” she said. “And I thought that, too, and the more I hear it, the more it reiterates that there is no face, personality type or job in the veterinary world that is free of that burden. Suicide and mental illness doesn’t have a face.”

A friend and previous colleague of Witte’s said she had been in a dark place and considered suicide. The friend’s sister worked for the national suicide hotline.

Witte’s friend told her, “honestly my sister works for them, and when I was going through my things and (the friend’s sister) asked me bluntly if I had ever considered suicide.”

“That’s a scary question to ask someone, but I think it’s a necessary question. If the answer is yes to that, something’s got to give,” Witte said.

Overall, Witte said mental illness is becoming an open discussion, but it needs to be talked about even more.

“I think, unfortunately, it’s such a sensitive topic that people are scared to talk about it,” she said. “You question if we make it a more verbally acceptable conversation, can we make a bigger difference?”

Witte graduated in 2014 from veterinary medicine school, and Williams graduated in the early-to-mid 90s. Both veterinarians said mental illness and wellness were not truly addressed during their education.

“The wellness issue was just not at all part of the curriculum, and hasn’t been since then in quite some time,” Williams said. “As a young veterinarian, there was a lot of internalization — even to this day. I see a lot of, put your nose to the grind stone and do your work, and don’t let it get to you.”

Youngs said at Iowa State, they recognize that high achieving students will be entering into a new atmosphere that will be even more challenging — making embedded counseling very important for the college.

“(Students are) coming in with a lot of other students who are the best in their class,” she said.

Youngs said teaching students, from as early as their orientation to the school, to handle the stress and pressure of the education and being around other high-achieving students is important to introducing lifelong, stress-reducing skills.

“It’s important that students are continuing to develop effective response to stress, and anxiety, and just managing the pressure that comes with high-level education,” she said.

Williams said the Iowa Veterinary Medical Association and AVMA continue to work together to find new resources for struggling veterinarians and hosting multiple meetings each year to discuss mental illness within the profession.

“Continuing to talk about it, continuing to try and work to reduce the stigma that is attached to mental issues, and substance abuse issues where they exist, it will only do our profession a world of good in the long run.”

For the public, Williams said veterinarians don’t want sympathy or charity — they just want empathy.

To those who are in the profession, Williams said there are resources available for anyone struggling with mental health or considering suicide.

“I can only say, you are not alone,” Williams said.

If you or anyone you know is struggling with a suicidal crisis or emotional distress, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is a 24/7, toll-free hotline. The hotline can be called at 1-800-273-8255.

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